Been there… Done that
Currently, I am travelling across Europe. When I meet people the 1-2 questions I get asked most often are: where have you been? And where do you come from?
These questions can be asked by complete strangers, policemen, shop attendants or even friends who are letting you sleep on their couch. The answer to these questions is often not important, because frequently people are not actually interested in your personal experiences - they want to tell you about theirs.
As a result, these questions are inevitably followed by the commonly overused and ridiculous statement “Oh yes, I’ve been there, I’ve done ...insert country here…”
This statement is obviously and blatantly false. It doesn’t even make grammatical or logical sense. A country is an imagined community, an abstract concept, measuring thousands of kilometers across and encompassing a population of millions of people with unique and individual lives. A country is not an activity that you do, like walking your dog or cleaning the bathroom.
There is absolutely, no possible way, (unless you live in Liechtenstein - which is 160km sq), that you have done everything or been everywhere in said country. Furthermore, things change and the country you ‘did' fifteen or twenty years ago is a very different place now. Try visiting a museum in modern Iraq or trekking in Taliban occupied (or American ‘liberated’) Afghanistan if you don’t believe me.
It is manifestly impossible that you went to wherever on a 90 day tourist visa and left no stone unturned. Nowhere is ever completely explored and there is never enough time to do everything. If anything, travelling around a country highlights the areas or things you missed and identifies what you want to return for.
For example I am travelling around Europe for 8 months. So far in three months I have been to Paris, France;
Road tripped around England, Wales and Scotland for two weeks, climbing a few mountains and visiting some neolithic archaeological sites;
Hiked a mountain/waterfall or two in Iceland for a week;
Circumnavigated the Netherlands by bicycle for a fortnight;
Continued cycle touring into Germany down the Rhine and Neckar rivers for a month;
Rock climbed in Schwabian Alps;
Hiked in the Black Forest;
Visited some castles;
City hopped across East Germany from Munich to Berlin;
(with a large dose of Holocaust/WWII tourism added for historical flavour)
via the Czech Republic/Prague;
Landing in Madrid and busing to Leon to do some hiking in the Picos de Europas.
The purpose of this list is not to brag (maybe a little), but to highlight that Europe is a big, big bunch of countries. While I may have visited 7 countries and three times as many cities in 90 days I have barely scratched the surface. There is an infinite amount of activities to do, people to meet, food to eat, beverages to drink and sights to see available here.
What I have got from travelling so far is a healthy dose of homesickness, appreciation of family and the realisation that I will need to come back to Scotland, Iceland, Germany...etc
If you point out that it is actually impossible to have ‘done’ a country the reply is something along the lines of… “of course I didn’t do everything”… or… “you know what I mean”. You’re right, you did not do everything, I’ve already described at great length the physically impossibility of this feat. And I clearly don’t know what you mean, because what you just said was not logical and didn’t really make sense.
So next time you want to show how well travelled and worldly you are, before you commit to absolute statements that are absolute impossibilities….think about what you are actually saying. Is travelling somewhere different and new just a tick box exercise or an excuse to remove a section of your scratch map? Did you get something deeper from it?
It’s not a competition. Next time, let’s use the conversation to discover what we both loved or hated about a place and what we might go back there for. There’s no need to brag, because trust me, you’re gonna lose.
